Each year infections of animals and plants by parasitic nematodes cause many billions of dollars of agricultural damage. Over a billion people worldwide, particularly in developing nations, are infected by nematodes and suffer from the resulting debilitating diseases. Currently, only a few investigators address problems of parasitic nematodes using C. elegans. To encourage and facilitate more interactions between the C. elegans and parasitic nematode communities, a workshop was held at the 2013 International C. elegans Meeting in which experts in plant, animal and human parasitic nematodes spoke on the life history and unique biology of these parasitic species and on outstanding issues in their field. A key goal of this session was to make C. elegans scientists aware of the issues and problems that parasitic nematode researchers face and pave the way for applying the powerful approaches and technologies that have advanced C. elegans research to parasitic nematodes.

New for 2015! Educators who have been wondering how to prepare their teaching resources for publication in an online repository should apply for this workshop, which will guide attendees through the submission process for both CourseSource and GSA PREP, and give them a dedicated time to work on their submissions. Robin Wright (Univ of Minnesota), Editor-in-Chief for CourseSource and GSA Education Committee member, and Beth Ruedi (GSA) will be on hand to describe the two resource portals, answer questions, and provide guidance to attendees.

The GSA Careers Luncheon is an excellent opportunity for undergraduates, graduate students, and postdoctoral fellows to have informal conversations with senior career scientists regarding the unique challenges and rewards of a scientific career. The luncheon is organized by topic table. Topics may include things like: transition to independence, work-family balance, teaching at undergraduate institutions, non-academic careers for scientists, the when, how, and why of networking, dealing with difficult colleagues, etc. The senior career scientists include speakers at the conference, GSA volunteer leaders, and others. Interested students and postdocs will meet in the Private Dining Room (PDR) in DeNeve Cafeteria.

This workshop aims to discuss available techniques for analyzing gene function in select tissues of adult C. elegans. Establishing such approaches is a critical objective for the field to fully understand how specific tissues contribute to organismal phenotypes.

Optical imaging, microfluidic approaches and other new techniques have expanded the possibilities for using C. elegans to study aging, sleep and other behaviors. In this workshop, eight speakers will present short descriptions of different technical approaches for long term imaging of C. elegans. Speakers will provide specific technical details and discuss costs, expertise required, and scientific/practical considerations for data collection & interpretation. After the short workshop talks are completed, there will be a roughly 30 minute question and discussion period for the audience with all participants.

This workshop aims to bring together laboratories working on or interested in the field of quantitative genetics and natural variation in C. elegans and other nematodes. The quantitative genetics community is rapidly developing new resources and techniques that facilitate the molecular identification of quantitative trait loci. Examples are the use of genome wide association studies together with classical recombinant inbred line screens and the development of high-density introgression strains that facilitate dissection of QTL regions. Furthermore, identification of the underlying quantitative trait nucleotides/genes is also rapidly advancing. The ever increasing availability of mutant strains allows for rapid complementation studies and the development of the CRISPR/CAS9 system makes it possible to induce specific mutations in wild strains. Bringing together groups that are on the forefront of these developments allows for exchange and new combinations of ideas and experiences with all these techniques.

For the 2015 International C. elegans meeting, WormBase will present two identical workshops (Thursday and Saturday) to cover some of WormBase's newer tools and data as well as ways in which the nematode research community may contribute data and annotations to the database. We will cover basics of data mining with WormMine (the WormBase instance of Intermine), introduce our instantiation of the JBrowse genome browser, and demo the new ParaSite website which hosts genome sequences for parasitic nematode species. We will discuss WormBase sequence data available in complementary resources such as Ensembl Genomes and the UCSC Assembly Hub for C. elegans and cover the basics of finding Gene Ontology (GO) data in WormBase and performing GO enrichment analysis. We will also provide a number of options for users to submit their own data using sequence variation data and gene concise descriptions as examples.

Recent advances in technology, preparative methods and analysis are opening new vistas in the anatomy of C. elegans. This workshop will introduce a variety of special techniques that greatly improve our understanding of structure vs function in many nematode tissues.

Question and answer session with faculty panelists from varied perspectives. Discussion will center around how a PUI (primarily undergraduate institution) differs from other schools, what's it like looking for a job at a PUI now, and how search committees and departments look at candidates.

This GSA-sponsored discussion is an excellent opportunity for graduate students, postdoctoral fellows and undergraduate students to have informal conversations with GENETICS and G3 journal editors about the peer-review and scientific publishing process in general, and more specifically, in the GSA's two journals.

Topics may include: the peer-review process, open access, writing to get
published, where and how can your work have the most impact, how to create
effective figures and tables, the standards of each journal, revisions and
editing, and ethical issues in publishing. Interested students and
postdoctoral fellows should go to the De Neve Plaza Room.

Please note, due to the popularity of this discussion, it will now be held in the De Neve Plaza Room rather then the DeNeve Private Dining Room.

Question and answer session with tenured faculty panelists. Panelists will share their experiences concerning the balancing act of teaching, research, and service. Discussion will include topics such as tenure requirements, collaboration, and getting along with others in your department.

This workshop is designed to help researchers who wish to use high-throughput genomics to study gene regulation and want to find out where to start. We also encourage participation from experienced researchers who would like to contribute to the discussion. We will cover ChIP-seq, RNA-seq, and small RNA-seq techniques. For each, we will discuss experimental issues such as sample preparation and controls; analysis issues such as normalization; data interpretation and discussion of the strength and weaknesses of each technique.

Published tracking methods have been designed for different, but often overlapping,
purposes and they each have advantages and disadvantages, including differing degrees of availability and adaptability. Driven by the desire for real-time analysis, higher-throughput, and more informative features, there are still a number of labs working on developing the next generation of worm trackers. This workshop will have three purposes:

1) To share recent advances in worm tracking with the broader community
2) To get feedback from the community on what new technologies would be most useful in their work
3) To discuss the possibility of coordinating efforts where possible and to
consider working towards a more universal open source worm tracker that can serve as a shared basis for future developments

The anatomical foundation of much C. elegans research derives from classic light and electron microscopy studies in the 1970s and 1980s. More modern methods of EM reconstruction are now extending these studies to different stages and conditions. The first half of this workshop will present and discuss methods and challenges in large-scale and high-throughput EM anatomy.

The stereotyped anatomy of C. elegans allows unique identification of cells. However without extensive training such identification remains challenging. The second half of the workshop will focus on progress in manual and automation of cell ID, mostly in light/fluorescence microscopy datasets, in embryos and larvae/adults. Cell ID in the nervous system and other tissues will be discussed. We encourage participants to bring their own cell ID challenges, questions, and solutions to the workshop.

For the 2015 International C. elegans meeting, WormBase will present two identical workshops (Thursday and Saturday) to cover some of WormBase's newer tools and data as well as ways in which the nematode research community may contribute data and annotations to the database. We will cover basics of data mining with WormMine (the WormBase instance of Intermine), introduce our instantiation of the JBrowse genome browser, and demo the new ParaSite website which hosts genome sequences for parasitic nematode species. We will discuss WormBase sequence data available in complementary resources such as Ensembl Genomes and the UCSC Assembly Hub for C. elegans and cover the basics of finding Gene Ontology (GO) data in WormBase and performing GO enrichment analysis. We will also provide a number of options for users to submit their own data using sequence variation data and gene concise descriptions as examples.

The sequencing of the genome of the nematode C. elegans remains one of the milestones of modern biology, and this genome sequence is the essential backdrop to a vast body of work on this key model organism. As Dobzhansky said, “Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution”, and it is clear that complete understanding of C. elegans will only be achieved when it is placed in an evolutionary context. The field of comparative nematode genomics is now moving forward rapidly, with many new species of Caenorhabditis having been identified in the last decade, and new initiatives to explore the genomics and population genomics of the genus. In particular an open "Caenorhabditis Genomes Project" has been initiated to generate draft genome sequence for the majority of the remaining unsequenced species.

This workshop will

- provide context and overview of the need for and promise of a Caenorhabditis genomes project
- review the current state of the art in Caenorhabditis species discovery, diversity and genomics
- bring participants fully up-to-date with progress and plans
- present vignettes of current research being done with the new diversity of genomes
- encourage and consolidate community opinion, needs and plans

Schedule:

1:00 pm Welcome, Mark Blaxter, organiser
1:05 pm The phylogeny of Caenorhabditis, Karin Kiontke, NYU
1:20 pm What will a fully sequenced phylogeny of Caenorhabditis do for me?, TBC
1:40 pm Current status of the CGP, Georgios Koutsovoulos, University of Edinburgh
1:50 pm Improving Caenorhabditis genome assembly with long read data, Erich Schwarz, Cornell University
2:00 pm Community guided discussion: What do we need from the Caenorhabditis Genomes Project?
2:20 pm Community taskforce: Who will do what to make this vision a reality?

Undergraduate conference attendees will attend a plenary session with two talks presented at a level appropriate for an undergraduate audience. Participants will then have a chance to talk to a panel of graduate students about applications, interviewing, admission, choosing a lab and quality of life in graduate school.

Workshop attendees will be introduced to several different resources available to teachers on how to use this model organism in the classroom. Louisa Stark, recipient of the 2015 Elizabeth W. Jones Award for Excellence in Education, will present the Learn.Genetics and Teach.Genetics resources.

In just a few years' time, CRISPR-based genome engineering has become an essential tool for many C. elegans groups. This exciting technology is still rapidly evolving, with new insights being gained on an almost daily basis. This workshop offers an opportunity to learn about the latest developments in CRISPR/Cas9 genome engineering, share ideas, and gain practical tips, protocols, and insights to enable the successful application of this technology. In a series of short talks, researchers actively developing novel methods or improvements will present their work, with a focus on practical, technical advice. Topics that will be discussed include improvements to efficiency and selection of genome edits, and novel Cas9 applications. The talks will be followed by a Q&A session. The workshop will end with a summarizing overview of the field by Geraldine Seydoux.